


someone to be quiet with

by kwritten



Series: Cleveland Hellmouth Slayer Tower Series [2]
Category: Buffy the Vampire Slayer
Genre: Cleveland Hellmouth, F/F, Female Friendship, Female-Centric, Femslash, Femslash February, Gen, Post-Chosen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-02-04
Updated: 2015-02-04
Packaged: 2018-03-10 12:02:29
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,372
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3289634
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kwritten/pseuds/kwritten
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>set shortly before 'undercover agent style' <br/>after a month of research and many frustrating phone calls to england that do not result in back-up being given, dawn sends her team out to stop an apocalypse and logan stays behind to keep watch with her.</p>
            </blockquote>





	someone to be quiet with

Sometimes Dawn’s life feels like a long line of babysitters.  
  
She can list off her sister’s friends and the times that they just so happened to come by the house with a pizza and a movie when Buffy wasn’t home which actually meant “there’s a Big Bad something and I’m on Dawn-duty” as if she didn’t know their code.  
  
(If she were to write this list down in black and white, more than half of them would have a delicate line slashed through them, signifying death or nothing at all.)  
  
Which is why when Logan slouches through the door of her room asking about pizza and holding a copy of  _Bend it Like Beckham_ in her hand (sort of like someone told her that she’d like it, but she’s still really unsure) Dawn tries not to roll her eyes with annoyance.  
  
  
  
She did the fucking surveillance all last month single-handedly.  
  
She’s the one that found the old wonky manuscript discarded by previous historians, translated it, emailed the translation to Giles and Andrew, emailed them again a week later when they didn’t respond, spent a good six hours arguing with the medievalist Giles has on retainer back in England, re-translated the text into Archaic Latin for the pompous old codger, sent another three emails, got the witches in Cleveland to do a tracing spell for her, made them do it again when she saw they had intentionally fucked it up, did it herself when they intentionally did it wrong a third time, and then had a six hour screaming match with Andrew via Skype.   
  
She called a meeting of all the Slayers in the Cleveland area, told them the mission, provided them with maps and walkies, organized their retrieval, and created a distraction team to keep the local authorities out of harm’s way.  
  
She had actually just sent all the Slayers out with the weapons they needed and implicit instructions as to how to (a) avoid certain death and (b) hopefully prevent an apocalypse.  
  
Much to everyone’s annoyance and overwhelming distrust. She could tell that they were all humoring her. That three months of work and her very careful planning was all the workings of a pitiful teenage girl who just wanted to  _matter_.  
  
So while they all took her plans and maps and the spell she had whipped up in the kitchen the night before – they also weren’t expecting to come in contact with anything. No one had even called in one of the hard-hitters. Usually a mission this big would have Buffy or Faith or Kennedy at the helm – a Slayer with more experience and higher levels of training. But no one was taking this seriously, despite how loud Dawn shouted into the telephone at England. Buffy was busy with Riley and Sam down in Brazil. Faith was undercover in Washington DC again and couldn’t be extracted. And Kennedy was currently in an alternate dimension with Willow and Illyria, that mission was all very hush-hush, but from her cursory hacking into Buffy’s email account, Dawn figured that it was a political move – loaning out a Slayer in order to prevent an invasion (or to ensure a debt and future favors, that was the part that was unclear and a little shady).  
  
Which all boils down to the very clear and simple fact that now, all Dawn can do is sit in the Slayer Tower and wait to see who doesn’t come back.  
  
Some things never change.  
  
  
  
Dawn orders Indian instead of pizza and snorts at the movie in Logan’s hand before turning on  _The Fifth Element_  because she needs a side of hope with her aloo gobi. They eat in silence (aside from Dawn’s occasional sniffles) which Dawn has always appreciated about Logan.  
  
Not that she knows Logan all that well.  
  
She’s one of the newest recruits. Some kind of mysterious backstory – only because she’s never told it. Dawn isn’t even sure how old she is. Something in the twenties range, probably.   
  
Somewhere between the veggie samosas and the chocolate ice cream Dawn digs out of the freezer she says, “They’re not all going to come back, you know.”  
  
Somewhere between the chocolate ice cream and them sitting in silence watching a clock tick by slowly, Logan says, “You don’t know that for sure.”  
  
  
Dawn has the decency not to laugh.   
  
  
They fall asleep in a tangle of limbs on the floor of the living room, Dawn closing her eyes to the inevitable about an hour after they should have been back.  
  
“They should be back by now,” she whispers.  
  
“You don’t know that for sure.”  
  
Dawn will think very seriously about screaming at this stoic girl with short hair and too many piercings and baggy jeans, but then she’ll recognize that haunted tone that they are passing back and forth between each other like children playing hot potato with an old rag.   
  
  
  
Four hours after the team should have been back, they stop pretending to sleep and start playing Monopoly and turn on _Princess Diaries_  because Dawn can’t think of anything else she’d rather not be watching. They laugh uproariously at all of the simplest jokes and no one really wins at Monopoly.  
  
  
Six hours after the team should have been back, Dawn says the thing she’s been dreading having to say ever since she realized Logan had been chosen for Dawn-duty.  
  
“I’m sure Kira’s fine.” And she doesn’t mean it so much as wish it and want it more badly than she’s ever wanted anything in her life before that moment.  
  
Logan laughs under her breath, “If she’s not I’ll kick her ass myself for making me worry.”  
  
Then, Dawn teaches her how to make apple pancakes – she tops hers with the leftover aloo gobi and Logan does the totally normal syrup and butter thing, which is okay. And the kitchen is enough of a mess afterwards that cleaning up keeps them busy for a while.  
  
  
Eight hours after the team should have been back, Logan begins to cry long, low sobs and Dawn holds her tight and whispers nothing into her friend’s ear. Because there’s nothing to say.  
  
And then she calls Giles and gives him a piece of her mind.   
  
He very calmly tells her to give the girls another couple of hours before presuming the worst – you know how impulsive Slayers can be, it’s possible that they just lost track of time.  
  
And Dawn very calmly tells him to fuck himself with an ax and then hangs up.  
  
  
Ten hours after the team should have been back, Dawn is very nearly done prepping a simple locator spell that took three phone calls to the Melbourne chapter of Slayer Central to complete, when a very weak and pale Kira came through the door, holding up Meghan with the help of Amanda on the her other side.   
  
Dawn ran quickly to them and relieved Kira of her burden.   
  
She tried not to watch Logan take Kira in her arms and press a kiss onto her forehead. She tried not to hear them crying and whispering to each other. But they all heard and they all saw.  
  
And maybe that was better.   
  
  
  
Dawn sent seven slayers into the fray that night and got three back.   
  
  
  
“I’d probably make a better General if I didn’t have to fucking fight you on everything.”  
  
“Now, Dawn. There’s no need to be rude.”  
  
“Actually Giles. There’s a million fucking reasons for me to be rude right now. If you had just gotten that giant stick out of your ass and listened to me, we wouldn’t have lost four good Slayers. FOUR GIRLS DIED because you were so sure that I’m an idiot. I’m not a child, Giles.”  
  
“Well, now, you can’t place the blame for this on me. If you hadn’t been so willful—”  
  
“I’m not a child, Giles. I’m not even sure I’m human. In fact – I’m pretty sure that if I put my mind to it, I could do more damage to you than—”  
  
“I’m so sorry Mr. Giles, Dawn can’t come to the phone right now … yes, I will type up the report and email it to you in the morning … no the girls are all quite positive there’s no more threat in that area … yes I will pass on your sentiments … honestly Mr. Giles? Don’t call us. We’ll call you.”  
  
“Logan you just hung up on Giles.”  
  
“Yeah and you threatened to kill him I think.”  
  
Meghan’s voice, hollow and hoarse, came from the kitchen, “He deserved every bit of it. Now you two come in here and eat.”   
  
Meghan liked to make lasagna when things were hard. And losing four friends to an unspeakable evil meant two different kinds of lasagna.   
  
  
  
Logan sat next to Kira on the couch more often now and they giggled more than they used to. As if living through death while apart somehow made them more comfortable with living next to each other.   
  
Amanda sometimes looked longingly at them, like they were a shooting star that might burn out at any moment. Dawn and Megan would take her out shopping, Meghan still limping a bit on her left leg for a few more months than she’d like, Dawn determined to give the leggy girl some hope through retail therapy.   
  
  
  
When Faith finally managed to come through and check in on them, she noticed that the house was different from before she left. Mostly she noticed Logan and Dawn lying on floors with their legs intertwined, saying nothing.  
  
“No Kira isn’t jealous, what are you talking about, Faith?”  
  
“You just… spend a lot of time together is all. You don’t…?”  
  
Dawn shrugged, “We’re friends, that’s all.”  
  
“Friends are … good.”  
  
“She’s someone I can be quiet with.”  
  
Faith was silent for a beat, “I missed a group email, didn’t I?”  
  
Dawn smiled, “Or thirty. But who’s counting?”  
  
  
That night Faith found Dawn curled up in Logan’s bed like a cat, Logan placidly reading a comic book while Dawn slept. She stood in the hallway watching them for a minute, Dawn’s steady breathing in perfect harmony with the speed at which Logan’s eyes moved across the pages.  
  
Kira came up behind her and whispered, “Aren’t they cute?”  
  
“This happens all the time?”  
  
Kira rolled her eyes, “Dawn takes over someone’s bed every night. I don’t think she’s slept in her bed alone since… Well. We all have trouble sleeping these days. Maybe it’ll be easier when we get in some new recruits, fill up some of the empty space, but…”  
  
“And it doesn’t bother you?”  
  
Kira laughed, “Only when she steals the covers. Which is always.”  
  
  
  
  
“Well I’ve done the assessment you requested Giles and…”  
  
“What is it, Faith? Do I need to send someone over there?”  
  
“No,” Faith paused and thought about the Cleveland house. “No. I think you need to trust Dawn and let her run things here the way she has been.”  
  
“Well I’d feel more comfortable if you were the resident Slayer, even if you only stay part-time.”  
  
“I can’t promise anything. They don’t really need me Giles.”  
  
“Well after that fiasco last month—”  
  
“Giles, I’ve been here and I’ve seen it. I’ve helped with the clean-up. That  _fiasco_  last month is on your head. Next time Dawn requests back-up you better fucking give it to her. Or I’ll tell Buffy myself just exactly what I think about your management skills.”  
  
“Faith—”  
  
“Also that dipshit historian you have over there in England? Good luck with him. Next time he questions Dawn’s intel get a second opinion.”  
  
Faith hung up and stared at the phone in her hand. Yeah, she was the rebel Slayer – but since the First she’d been doing a better job of acting like a team player.   
  
“You hung up on Giles.”  
  
Faith turned, startled. When she saw it was Dawn she smiled ruefully, “Yeah well… wasn’t the first time.”  
  
“I feel like I need to send a memo telling people to stop hanging up on him on my account.”  
  
“He deserved it.”  
  
“That’s what Logan said. And Meghan.”  
  
“I like Logan.”  
  
“I knew you would. She reminded me of you when she first came.”  
  
“That can’t be a good sign.”  
  
Dawn shook her head, unwilling to let Faith’s self-deprecation get in the way of a good evening. “The girls want to take you on a field trip. There’s a … well, I’ll let them show you.”  
  
“What are you going to do?”  
  
Dawn gestured around her, “What I always do. Wait.”  
  
  
  
  
The ‘field trip’ was a vampire nest. Easy hunting, everyone got a piece. And Faith got to watch Dawn’s team in action. They were a well-oiled machine, everyone looking out for each other and knowing they could rely on each other.   
  
She’d visited most of the other Slayer Towers by this point and knew that this was different. Too many of the Slayerettes were still trying to  _prove_  themselves. That deep sense of being a ‘Chosen One’ – One Girl in All the World – seemed irrefutably embedded in their DNA. Sure, most houses were figuring out how to be a team slowly. But it seemed a process born of necessity rather than an organic fact.  
  
The Cleveland team was something else entirely, it was a family.  
  
They reminded Faith of the Scoobies back in Sunnydale, the give and take, the flow, the ease with which everyone fit into each other.   
  
The way Dawn didn’t seem to actually need a bed of her own.  
  
It was there in their Slaying. They moved like one many-armed person. And Faith knew that wasn’t organic. And it wasn’t because of their loss – everyone has dead people. Every team loses a few players now and then.   
  
She didn’t write it in her report, the thing that made this Slayer Tower different from any of the others she had gone to assess. She didn’t even send Buffy a pointed email about little sis and how they should be watching her more carefully.  
  
That wasn’t her job.  
  
And anyway, she’d rather no one knew.  
  
  
  
It felt a bit like she was keeping them safe by keeping them secret.   
  
And catching Dawn’s eye over the dinner table that night after Slaying, Faith knew she felt the same way.

**Author's Note:**

> A friend pointed out some discomfort she had with the characterization of Giles in this particular piece and so I thought I'd make a note of my intentions and why I made the decisions I made in hopes that this won't be seen as just character-bashing (though I admit taking a small bit of pleasure in the hostility shown towards Giles in this piece):
> 
> (Sorry about the problematic Giles-bashing. But despite my personal distaste for the character, I could still him making a poor decision like this. Trusting Dawn as an adviser isn't something I see him doing naturally (and I find it odd when other future fics posit that she would fall into a role of power post-Chosen without having to prove herself in really difficult and challenging ways) and he's also the kind of general who would be willing to lose a handful of soldiers in a gamble than spend resources when he isn't sure. And for the people in the trenches this is a dick move. But to him four girls in an army of thousands isn't a big loss. And is easily the kind of mistake Giles is likely to fall into.) ((Also it was either Giles refusing resources, Buffy doing something similar, or Dawn not asking for help. In order to explore her taking charge and establishing herself in the war machine pecking order, Giles was the most logical absent-ignorant-CO.))
> 
> I deeply apologize to any die-hard Giles' fans out there if this piece comes off as offensive. For the story arc to work, I needed a scapegoat and I stand by my characterization - in this scenario, it is more likely that Giles would dismiss teenage, untrained Dawn and trust the historian he has on the books for situations like this.


End file.
